Hatred and Hunger
by Hawki
Summary: 2019 Movie Oneshot: A hyena's belly was never full. Hyenas had been at war with lions for time immemorial. Hatred and hunger had always driven them, and always would.


_A/N_

_So, for awhile, when posting _Lion King _material, I've stated my doubts for the 2019, believing it would be a soulless cash-in. Having since seen said remake, I can now say that I was 100%, absolutely...correct._

_Yeah, I'd actually be happier if I was wrong, but that's the way the cookie crumbles. Still, it does have some nuggets of gold buried in its morass, so there's that I guess. Enough to get me to drabble this up._

* * *

**Hatred and Hunger**

_I've been here before._

The thought swirled around in Nala's mind as surely as the smoke did from the ground. Sulphur emanated from hyena territory, as surely as the stench of death. Bones piled up here, for there was no grass on which it could rest, and be returned to the earth from whence it came. The hyenas had killed everything, as surely as they had in the Pride Lands. In the years since Scar had been deposed, life had slowly returned to her home. For the hyena territory? Not so much. As a cub, she had been frightened. As a lioness, she was now disgusted. As queen, she reminded herself to keep her composure as she and her hunting party stood firm on the border. On the boundary between life and death, between day and night, between her people and the savages that lay beyond. Savages that she could see leering at her as she watched them sneak out of the shadows, led by the queen of the litter. The queen bitch, as she sometimes called her, for what were hyenas but savage dogs?

"And so, the queen of Pride Rock descends from on high to mingle with us lesser mortals."

Though far better to call the lead dog by her name. Shenzi. She'd intended on giving her at least a nod of respect to the hyenas' matriarch, but now, she couldn't even manage that. Her fur was greyer, her walk slower, but the glint in her eyes was the same.

"So good to see you my dear."

The same hatred. The same hunger.

"I cannot say the same Shenzi. None in the Pride Lands could."

"Ah yes, this is where you say that it would be best if you never saw us at all?"

Nala scowled. Shenzi's hatred of her and her pride, she could live with. Hatred wasn't what chilled her bones. Rather, it was the hunger. The knowledge that if fang and claw were drawn and battle declared, that if she fell, her body not feed the grass, but Shenzi's belly. She watched as the hyena began walking down the line, as her hyenas watched on, leering. One of her lionesses growled, but Nala shot her a look. The king's orders had been clear, and whatever she thought of them, they would be obeyed.

"You've lost weight," the hyena said.

Nala fought the urge to growl herself. And Shenzi must have noticed her silence, because she kept talking.

"That it?" she sneered. "No fire? No teeth and claw? Was motherhood really that draining for you?" She started trotting forward. Over the boundary between the shadows and the light. More lionesses growled, but Nala walked forward. If it came to war, so be it, but she had to let Shenzi make the first move. So lion and hyena came face to face, though given her height, Nala looked down on her in more ways than one.

"Little Nala is all grown up," Shenzi sneered. "I'm so proud."

"Watch your tongue, Shenzi."

"Oh I did little girl, I did, no matter how many times I was tempted to finish what happened that day." She glanced back to the shadows. To death and decay. "I wonder my dear, without Scar to protect you, what are you but the king's whore?"

One of her lionesses, Shuri, roared and prowled forward. "You will watch your tongue with the queen, hyena."

Shenzi snorted. "Can the queen not speak for herself?" She licked her chops while looking at Shuri, before returning her gaze to Nala. "Well, it matters not. The king is dead. Long live the king I suppose, who has sent his pride to break bone with us." She bowed her head, but Nala could tell there was no respect behind it. "Give us your demands then, oh queen, if our poor ears can withstand the nobility in your words."

Nala glanced at Shuri. With a scowl, her fellow lioness returned to the line. Only then, did Nala speak.

"Shenzi, this is your last warning. The Pride Lands are not yours. The promises of Scar died with him, and you are no longer entitled to take prey here. These are the king's orders. Break them, and your lands will have far more bones then they do currently."

Shenzi cackled and glanced at her hyenas. They began to giggle.

"Are you listening?" Nala asked.

"Oh, I hear the words," she said. "But I must say I developed a taste for zebra and antelope during the last king's reign, and one finds that the vermin of these parts just doesn't do it for me anymore."

"You killed everything bigger. That your bellies are empty is on you."

"But a hyena's belly is never full, oh queen. And seeing your prey return to the Pride Lands…" She glanced at her hyenas, who were now making sad eyes at Nala in the way her children still tried. "Would you deny us, oh queen? Would you consign us to starve?"

"I would let my subjects live life in the knowledge that their predators take only what is needed. That children may grow and have children of their own before fearing the touch of claw or fang." Nala growled. "I saw the way you hunted for years, Shenzi. No discrimination. No restraint."

"And yet your bellies grew full because of it!" Shenzi spat. She looked across the lionesses. "So many I see still hunger. I wonder how many were oh so glad to have a king who let them take what was needed? Who despaired at the defiance of the false queen?"

"The queen mother is-"

"The Outlanders have so many stories to tell," Shenzi whispered. "Banished, forced to live off scraps because of a king who puts prey before his own kind."

Nala scowled. She didn't want to talk about the Outlanders. No-one did. In part, because Shenzi was correct – she had no doubt that some lionesses would love to be able to hunt with impunity as they once had. In part because she wondered if Simba had passed on conflict to the future – short term mercy for long term bloodshed. Fighting a war against the hyenas would be costly. Fighting against them and the Outlanders at the same time would be a war the pride couldn't hope to win.

"You've been warned, Shenzi," Nala said – she had to bring this charade to an end. "One more step in the Pride Lands, and you'll find that you and many of your kind will never step anywhere else again."

Shenzi barked. She barred her fangs. Nala just stood there, hoping that Shenzi couldn't see the fear that lurked within her.

"I should have killed you all those years ago," Shenzi whispered.

Nala remained silent, even as Shenzi looked past her to the Pride Lands. "Oh for the Golden Age," she whispered. "Where Scar kept us fed in his life." She looked back at Nala. "Did I ever tell you how he kept us fed in death as well?" Shenzi's gaze lingered on Shuri. "You really should try it sometime my dear. It turns out the meat of lions has a taste to it that is simply not to be found in-"

Shuri lunged. Nala put her paw in front of her, so that her pounce was interrupted in mid-jump. But that was nothing as Shenzi leapt forward against the queen as well. Claws out, fangs beared, hatred and hunger overriding any other consideration.

She never made contact. With a speed that belied her age, Nala used her other paw to push against her, then pushed the hyena down into the ground. One paw against Shenzi's neck, the other now held high with its claws out. The hyenas howled. The lionesses roared. They looked ready to fight.

"Enough!" Nala yelled.

They still looked ready, only now they were now clearly less willing. She looked down at Shenzi, who even struggling to breathe, was still glaring at Nala. Hatred, hunger, she couldn't tell the two apart anymore.

"Close your eyes Shenzi."

The hyena tried to whisper something.

"Close your eyes."

"If you seek my death, I'll face it with-"

Nala roared and brought her paw down. Shenzi closed her eyes. A moment later, a scar ran over the eyelid of her right one. A moment after that, as Nala let the hyena go, she let out a howl.

"A scar to remember your former king by," Nala said. "And to remember me."

Shenzi barked. So did the hyenas. But Nala took some steps forward, and with her, so did her hunting party.

"A warning, Shenzi. And that is your final one."

The hyenas kept barking. Right up until the queen roared. After that…

…they ran away.

Nala looked at her party. No-one said anything, but she could guess what they were thinking. If the hyenas came into the Pride Lands again, if the continued to feed on their subjects, whose numbers had yet to recover from Scar's madness, what then? War? Famine? Both?

"Why didn't you kill her?"

She looked at Shuri.

"Why didn't you kill her?" the lioness repeated. "Does she not deserve it?"

Nala watched the hyenas running away, across their barren land. What had caused it to go wrong, she wondered? Had they let hunger get the best of them? Or had hatred and malice caused them to break the Circle?

"My queen?"

"Look at the lands beyond you Shuri," Nala said. "What do you see?"

"Bones, rocks…more bones…"

"What you see is death," Nala said. "A sight that I was well accustomed to as I saw my land die around me. A sight that you, born after the return of the true king, did not." She looked at her hunting party, so many of them younger than she. "Death is never to be desired," she said. "I lived among death, and now, I live among life. I would never have us return to shadow." She cast one last group at the hyenas. At the few who lingered, looking at her from the darkness. "Not even for justice against their kind."

"And the Outlanders?" Shuri whispered.

"The Outlanders received mercy," Nala said. "And that is enough for now." She nodded, and began walking back to Pride Rock. "Come. The king awaits us."

In silence, the pack began heading back to their home. Away from the lands of shadow, their backs to it.

But shadows still upon their hearts.


End file.
